Citadis observations
Michael Kurkowski
Saturday, September 15, 2001 3:42 AM
All,
Had my first ride on a Citadis today. 3001 from Southbank tramstop to Mont
Albert, back to Port Melbourne then back to Spencer Street. Over all, it
was quite pleasant. A few (lengthy) observations of note were:
* A lot of people looked dumbfoundedly at it as it went past.
* Only about 25% of the passengers are used to the pushbutton doors. The
rest were standing at the doors waiting for them to open. This was a noted
problem in Sydney with the introduction of the C sets and first 20 Tangaras
- people would miss their stations because the doors wouldnt open for them.
The TA's were on hand to help this situation though.
* The destination was showing as "109 Mont Albert" and "109 Port Melb" on
the return. 3003 was running the 96 with desto "96 StKilda Beach" with the
end of the "h" cut of to appear as an "l". Huge improvement on yesterday's
"Tram109".
* The ride quality was great, although there was a lot of lateral movement
- you could see the front sway side to side from the back of the tram.
Presumably because the centre section is double jointed with no wheels.
Cornering was interesting. Although, that aside, the ride was still very
smooth.
* The acceleration knocks you off your feet. I watched us taking off with
some cars ex a set of traffic lights and we kept up with a Mitsubishi
Magna. Motorists clearly dont expect this and fail dismally trying to do
the stupid things they do to other trams. One car had to cut a corner and
seemingly accelerate hard to get out of our way when turning out of a side
street in front of us.
* There is a high pitched whine coming from the roof while accelerating
from start, but moreso when stopping. My guess would be something to do
with the AC inverter which would likely be located in the roof.
* The drivers cab is full width, separated from the passenger saloon by a
mostly glass baulkhead and glass door. The control desk has three LCD
screens - a large one as the main control showing a top diagram of the 3
section tram, that the panto is up, main breaker is active, and the door
status. It also shows a few other things. The two smaller LCD screens are
the two rear vision mirrors. The cameras for these are located immediately
above the drivers side window in an outward moulded section. The controller
is a single hand controller, controlled by the left hand. My assumption is
the big red button on the right is the vigilance control.
* It would appear that at a couple of the city stops, there is an insulator
right above the panto on the stop line. Once we had to roll backward a
little to remove ourselves from it.
* Internal space is well utilised. While there is only 40 seats, that could
easily be 50 if the tram wasn't disabled accessible. There is lots of
standing room. The Alstom (??) person on board quoted to another passenger
that it can have a crush loading of up to 200 - however admitting the tram
would be 100% packed in this situation (6 persons per square metre).
* The electronic bell is pathetically quiet, and sounds more like an
American locomotive bell than a tram bell. The horn, is quite effective at
getting Moron Motorists (tm) out of the way - it was used once on Victoria
Street when someone did a u-turn in front of us (-:
To note, 3001 doesn't have it's Metcard gear yet however all the provisions
for it are there. There were 3 tram attendants in attendance the whole
time, mainly to assist people with the relatively simple pushbutton doors,
the replacement of the bell cord with a large number of buttons, and
general enquiries.
I hope to have a couple of internal photos on line Monday night, mainly
looking forward from the passenger saloon into the cab, on the Port
Melbourne line.
Hope this has been of interest to some people (:
Regards
Michael.
--
Michael Kurkowski
Customer Support
Netstra Internet Services
Mail: [email protected]
Tel: 03-9497-1477
Fax: 03-9497-4266
Mob: 0411-461-481
URL: http://www.netstra.com.au
For More Info: [email protected]
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Had my first ride on a Citadis today. 3001 from Southbank tramstop to Mont
Albert, back to Port Melbourne then back to Spencer Street. Over all, it
was quite pleasant. A few (lengthy) observations of note were:
* A lot of people looked dumbfoundedly at it as it went past.
* Only about 25% of the passengers are used to the pushbutton doors. The
rest were standing at the doors waiting for them to open. This was a noted
problem in Sydney with the introduction of the C sets and first 20 Tangaras
- people would miss their stations because the doors wouldnt open for them.
The TA's were on hand to help this situation though.
* The destination was showing as "109 Mont Albert" and "109 Port Melb" on
the return. 3003 was running the 96 with desto "96 StKilda Beach" with the
end of the "h" cut of to appear as an "l". Huge improvement on yesterday's
"Tram109".
* The ride quality was great, although there was a lot of lateral movement
- you could see the front sway side to side from the back of the tram.
Presumably because the centre section is double jointed with no wheels.
Cornering was interesting. Although, that aside, the ride was still very
smooth.
* The acceleration knocks you off your feet. I watched us taking off with
some cars ex a set of traffic lights and we kept up with a Mitsubishi
Magna. Motorists clearly dont expect this and fail dismally trying to do
the stupid things they do to other trams. One car had to cut a corner and
seemingly accelerate hard to get out of our way when turning out of a side
street in front of us.
* There is a high pitched whine coming from the roof while accelerating
from start, but moreso when stopping. My guess would be something to do
with the AC inverter which would likely be located in the roof.
* The drivers cab is full width, separated from the passenger saloon by a
mostly glass baulkhead and glass door. The control desk has three LCD
screens - a large one as the main control showing a top diagram of the 3
section tram, that the panto is up, main breaker is active, and the door
status. It also shows a few other things. The two smaller LCD screens are
the two rear vision mirrors. The cameras for these are located immediately
above the drivers side window in an outward moulded section. The controller
is a single hand controller, controlled by the left hand. My assumption is
the big red button on the right is the vigilance control.
* It would appear that at a couple of the city stops, there is an insulator
right above the panto on the stop line. Once we had to roll backward a
little to remove ourselves from it.
* Internal space is well utilised. While there is only 40 seats, that could
easily be 50 if the tram wasn't disabled accessible. There is lots of
standing room. The Alstom (??) person on board quoted to another passenger
that it can have a crush loading of up to 200 - however admitting the tram
would be 100% packed in this situation (6 persons per square metre).
* The electronic bell is pathetically quiet, and sounds more like an
American locomotive bell than a tram bell. The horn, is quite effective at
getting Moron Motorists (tm) out of the way - it was used once on Victoria
Street when someone did a u-turn in front of us (-:
To note, 3001 doesn't have it's Metcard gear yet however all the provisions
for it are there. There were 3 tram attendants in attendance the whole
time, mainly to assist people with the relatively simple pushbutton doors,
the replacement of the bell cord with a large number of buttons, and
general enquiries.
I hope to have a couple of internal photos on line Monday night, mainly
looking forward from the passenger saloon into the cab, on the Port
Melbourne line.
Hope this has been of interest to some people (:
Regards
Michael.
--
Michael Kurkowski
Customer Support
Netstra Internet Services
Mail: [email protected]
Tel: 03-9497-1477
Fax: 03-9497-4266
Mob: 0411-461-481
URL: http://www.netstra.com.au
For More Info: [email protected]
------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
FREE COLLEGE MONEY
CLICK HERE to search
600,000 scholarships!
http://us.click.yahoo.com/47cccB/4m7CAA/ySSFAA/DiTxlB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->
Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/